The present invention relates to an image forming system having an image forming apparatus, such as a digital multiuse machine, that has various functions, such as scanner, printer, copy, fax, and network communications functions, etc.
Conventionally, image forming apparatuses, such as digital multiuse machines, have a function of printing print data from external devices connected by a network. Some of such digital multiuse machines have private printing and scheduled printing functions. With private printing, print data transmitted from the PC side is preserved in a storage device in the digital multiuse machine. After that, the print data stored in the storage device is printed in response to a user's print command on the digital multiuse machine. In scheduled printing, the printing start time specified from the PC side is stored in the storage device in the digital multiuse machine together with print data. The digital multiuse machine then prints the print data on the basis of the printing start time stored in the storage device.
However, in order to cause the digital multiuse machine to carry out print processing, private printing requires each of the print requesting users to operate the operating panel of the digital multiuse machine directly. In scheduled printing, in order to cause printing to be done at the specified time, it is required to set the printing start time each time a print request is made. When two or more users specify the same time, the digital multiuse machine carries out print processing in the order in which print data was accepted. For this reason, printouts for two or more users can be mixed up.